arbitraire vs arbitraires

Which to use

“arbitraire” and “arbitraires” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#9,958
“arbitraire” frequency rank: #20,633
“arbitraires” frequency rank: 30591
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	arbitraire	arbitraires
Definition	Qui est produit par la seule volonté de l’homme, sans avoir de règle ni de fondement naturel.	Pluriel de arbitraire.

Same sound, different letters: arbitraire vs arbitraires

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 10 letters. arbitraire runs 10 letters (VCCVCCVVCV) against arbitraires's 11 (VCCVCCVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

10 ch

arbitraire

11 ch

arbitraires

Same sound, different spelling - arbitraire / arbitraires

This is the hard kind. arbitraire and arbitraires are pronounced identically (\aʁ.bi.tʁɛʁ\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “arbitraire” sits inside “arbitraires”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 30591, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

arbitraire is recorded at frequency rank #9,958, classified as anadj, pronounced \aʁ.bi.tʁɛʁ\. arbitraires is at rank #20,633, tagged as anadj, pronounced \aʁ.bi.tʁɛʁ\.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 30591, this pair ranks #309,273 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of arbitraire vs arbitraires

Shared letters: abeirt. Private to "arbitraire": -. Private to "arbitraires": s.

"arbitraire" · 10 letters · shape VCCVCCVVCV · "arbitraires" · 11 letters · shape VCCVCCVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

arbitraire ← abritraire · arbbitraire · arbirtaire · arbitarire · arbitraier · arbitrairre · arbitrarie · arbitriare
arbitraires ← abritraires · arbbitraires · arbirtaires · arbitarires · arbitraiers · arbitrairess · arbitrairres · arbitrairse

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "arbitraire" for "arbitraires" ever safe?

No. They are pronounced the same (\aʁ.bi.tʁɛʁ\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.

Which is more common, "arbitraire" or "arbitraires"?

"arbitraire" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,958 in our French list, against #20,633 for "arbitraires". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

"arbitraire" and "arbitraires" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

Full dictionary entry for "arbitraire" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "arbitraires" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #309,273 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"arbitraire" and "arbitraires" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "arbitraire vs arbitrale". Nearby pair
Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #309,273 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.